The owl of Minerva spreads its wings only with the falling of the dusk. Philosophy comes too late to teach the world what it should have been; it only shows what the world has been.

The most thought-provoking thing in our thought-provoking time is that we are still not thinking. This is a sobering fact when we consider how much has been done, and how little we have understood of what has been done.

The most thought-provoking thing in our thought-provoking time is that we are still not thinking.

The mind is like a river. While it flows, it is never the same water; and while it thinks, it is never the same thought.

Man can do what he wills, but he cannot will what he wills.

The true function of philosophy is not to provide final answers, but to keep alive in us the sense of wonder at the world and our place in it.

We live on the surface of things. The only depth we know is the depth of our own ignorance when we mistake appearance for reality.

themarginalian.org

Fanny Wright and the Radical Courage of Being Real: The Forgotten Woman Who Pioneered Scientific Thinking and Free Love in America

While there is no doctrine so sacred that we shall approach its discussion with apprehension, there is none so extravagant that we shall treat its expression with contempt… We will reject no creed but the creed of force, nor any system of morality but that which teaches intolerance.

The terrible thing about the quest for truth is that you find it.

The effort to understand the universe is one of the very few things that lifts human life a little above the level of farce, and gives it some of the grace of tragedy.